Sanders’ philanthropy reflects love for baseball

While many high school classmates participated in athletics, Don Sanders sacked groceries and served as a stock boy at the local Safeway. He had no time for baseball, football or any other sport.

Raised in Mexia by an aunt and uncle after his parents divorced when he was a baby, Sanders spent his formative years at Fort Parker State Park, where his aunt worked at a concession stand. He never played Little League baseball, so at 77 Sanders is still refining his pitching repertoire.

As his friend Nolan Ryan notes, Sanders commits 100 percent to everything he does. So despite back problems, Sanders practiced his pitching for nearly two weeks in anticipation of the ceremonial first pitch he’ll throw at Minute Maid Park on Wednesday night, when the Astros honor him for 34 years of service to baseball in Houston.

The former Astros minority owner and founder of Ryan Sanders Baseball enlisted Class AA Corpus Christi Hooks pitching coach Gary Ruby for help recently. Sanders threw a 40-pitch bullpen session under Ruby’s supervision. He even asked to borrow a glove from his eldest son, Bret, to play catch with neighbors.

“Don’s a very unique person,” said Sanders’ longtime business partner, Ben Morris. “Clearly, with respect to his endeavors in the baseball area, when Don gets into something, he gets into it in a big way. From the time he was partners with John McMullen in the Astros deal, at one time or another he has kept his hand in the baseball world.

“Even today when he went to the Corpus Christi game in San Antonio, he comes back to lunch and is giving us a play-by-play on how the Hooks lost the game. Around number 70 years (of age), you would think the enthusiasm would wear off. But it doesn’t. He loves the game.”

Astros president Reid Ryan, who got financial backing from Sanders to purchase a minor league team that ultimately became the Round Rock Express in the late 1990s, considers Sanders one of the biggest backers of baseball in Texas.

Small stake in Astros

Sanders’ involvement in baseball in Houston began in the late 1970s. After John McMullen hired one of Sanders’ friends to help secure financing to buy the Astros, Sanders purchased a 2 percent stake in the club in 1979.

“We put up $6 million in equity, and we borrowed $11 million from a bank,” said Sanders, who made his fortune as an investment broker. “I just thought it would be fun to own a little bit of a baseball team. I had made enough money that I could afford it.

“Then in 1982, there was a reshuffling of the ownership, and I bought another 11 percent, so I became the largest minority shareholder. It was the largest minority ownership of any baseball team.”

Sanders’ stake in the Astros coincided with the arrival of eventual Hall of Famer Nolan Ryan, beginning a deep bond between the men and their families.

Sanders held a luncheon reception for the Ryans at his home. In time, the families would vacation together. Sanders then sold his stake in the Astros not long after McMullen made what is still considered one of the biggest mistakes in franchise history.

“I probably sold six months after Nolan left,” Sanders said. “I certainly wasn’t happy, nor did I think it was the right decision to not re-sign Nolan, but John and I were at odds during the whole time Nolan was leaving. I don’t think it had any direct relationship, but it probably had impact. It was probably part of several reasons why I sold.”

Sanders’ love of the Astros continued, however. He put up $1 million of his own money while joining 13 local companies in the Houston Sports Facility Partnership. That group raised $35 million to help the Harris County-Houston Sports Authority fund the proposal that eventually led to the $250 million ballot initiative voters approved in 1996 to build what is now Minute Maid Park.

The $1 million non-interest loan was eventually a $100,000 loss, because Sanders was paid back about $900,000. He built the baseball stadium at Kinkaid, turning a grassy area into a stadium with lights, batting cages and stands. He also donated a diamond for the KIPP School.

“It’s a real Little League baseball field,” he says proudly. “I do those things because I enjoy doing them. These are the things that I think will be here long after I’m gone, and they’ll have a major impact on young people for decades to come.”

Sanders overcame tremendous odds after his mother dropped him off in Mexia with his aunt and uncle, Sister and O.W. Miller. He was only a freshman in high school when O.W. died.

“They were a lot older than your normal parents,” he said. “You knew they cared for you, but it’s not the same relationship you would have with a mother and father you grew up with.”

Sanders has no regrets. Nonetheless, he has a soft spot for the less fortunate and animals. He also is the biggest backer of the Friends For Life no-kill animal shelter, having donated $3.5 million to build one of the Southwest’s top no-kill animal shelters.

Generous gifts

“I just think Don’s a remarkable person,” state Sen. John Whitmire said. “Somebody asked him to go to a KIPP Academy to see their after-school nutrition program. He sees their ball field is essentially just a sandlot, so he gets interested in asking them what it would take to upgrade the ball field.

“They give him an estimate, and he says, ‘Do it.’ Today they have one of the best ball fields in the city at a cost of $250,000, I might add. He gets attention because of his animal shelter, but he’s all over town quietly doing things, and he doesn’t ask for recognition.”

Sanders manages about $2 billion a year in investments for Sanders Morris Harris, but perhaps no person or group has received a better return on their investment with him than his alma mater, Sam Houston State University.

Sam Houston State was the only university Sanders considered attending, because the Bearkats offered him an annual $300 scholarship in photography. Almost 53 years later, he donated $1 million for an endowment that led to the opening in 2006 of the school’s $5.5 million Don Sanders Baseball Stadium, arguably the best baseball stadium in the Southland Conference.

Sanders also was a major driving force in the building of Round Rock’s Dell Diamond and Corpus Christi’s Whataburger Field, supporting the vision Reid Ryan proposed after

Nolan urged him to visit Sanders.

The kid who never played ball because he was too busy working at Safeway now has several fields named in his honor. He’s come a long way from that concession stand at Fort Parker State Park.

“He’s one of my most special friends,” Whitmire said. “There’s no doubt about it. It’s not based on political support. It’s based on being buddies. We’re just buddies, and those are special, special types of friends.”

Whitmire and Morris will be at Minute Maid Park to see Sanders throw out the first pitch Wednesday.

“I describe him as a loyal friend who is a doer,” Nolan Ryan says. “When he commits to something, he commits to it 100 percent, and he sees it through and does what he says he’ll do. He’s a loyal friend, and you’ll find a lot of people will tell you the same thing.”